Poems of my Green Guitar
Poems of my Green Guitar
Lorna Cheriton
by
the same author
Journey
to a Far Land
Journey
through Darkness
Journey
around the Sun
Autumn's
Gold and Brown
Poems
of my Green Guitar
to
Christopher Berks
in
appreciation of his encouraging and perceptive help in editing my poems and
curating them into this and other collections
©
LORNA CHERITON 2020
They
said, "You have a blue guitar,
You
do not play things as they are.
The
man replied, "Things as they are
Are
changed upon the blue guitar."
Wallace
Stevens,
"The
Man with the Blue Guitar"
Perhaps
I have a green guitar,
and
do not play things as they are.
I
know that bare facts as they are
are
changed upon the green guitar.
A
happening that has occurred
cannot
be captured in a word
but
on the green guitar to play
it
is my passion to portray
through
words or brushes thick with paint
and
through these media to acquaint
myself
and others with my mind
and
so connect with humankind.
Poems of my Green Guitar
Lorna Cheriton
Contents
After
Attending a Poetry Reading
The
Turing Test of Artificial Intelligence
Knowing
Like the Back of My Hand
Cross-country
Ski in Shadowbrook
Extreme Sport
Not
so spectacular as extreme skiing --
the
long trudge up a mountain
by
a bold athlete,
loaded
with pack and skis,
chipping
handholds,
cutting
footholds,
ice
picks stabbing the cliff face…
The
summit gained,
glorious
mountains surround
before
plunging down
through
untouched snow,
hurtling
down steep canyons...
Not
so photogenic as the skier's backflips
against
blue sky and frosted peaks...
Not
so fearsome
as
the slightest mistake's
tumbling
fall,
a
vulnerable body
somersaulting
in unyielding gravity...
Writing
my poem,
I
trudge up a mountain,
wondering
if any of these misshapen clumps of words
is
strong enough to rest my weight on.
Bringing up a Poem
When
I conceive a poem,
initial
exhilaration fills me.
When
it churns inside my gut,
I
know that morning sickness
was
the price
my
mother paid for me.
When
I push to birth a poem
that
resists entering the world,
it
comforts me that childbirth
has
its pain.
When
I struggle to refine
the
unkempt words that issue forth,
I
see myself, an unkempt child,
finding
my own way.
After Attending a Poetry Reading
These people paid to hear
him read;
now a hundred stand in
line,
and wait for him, their
books in hand
for him to sign; the
line’s not moving
they have time enough
to write their own poems.
After I Write the Poem
After
I write the poem,
a
butterfly lands and tastes,
checking
for nectar.
Magnetic Poetry
Morning
like liquid blue
leaves
me gasping.
Immense
wild blossoms
stagger
from summer showers,
teaching
secret tendrils
not
to bruise...
Mapping
my subconscious,
like
bricks of writer's block
suddenly
tumbling free,
tiny,
rectangular words
are
poetic babbling
when
on the printed page,
but
fall into serendipitous patterns,
suggesting
profound truths.
All
lace will burn my tongue,
building
there
when
a slender sunset
consumes
the evening.
What
my fingers create
challenges
comprehension
as
does a dream.
The Turing Test of Artificial Intelligence
(Alan
Turing proposed the following test to judge the success of an artificial
intelligence program: if a human cannot
tell if he is interacting with a computer or another human, the AI program is
successful.)
Two
poems the radio announcer reads,
inviting
listeners to apply the test
that
brilliant brain conceived:
which
poem was made by software
and
which by human mind.
Choosing
correctly, I ask myself:
what
thread of living soul
gives
me the clue?
A-I
to some is Holy Grail,
to
others over-rated;
making
machines to think like us, they say,
is
making airplanes based on birds --
those
silver bullets in the sky
don't
need to land in trees
or
build their nests or lay their eggs
nor
do birds need to carry us.
But
must A-I pass the Turing Test?
Is
being just like human always best?
About Words
In
Japanese my name,
not
just a word,
is
a miniature Mondrian work of art
a
design of squares and crosses.
I
make the sounds
of
my own language
and
understand
when
you speak them,
but
marvel at foreign language,
strange
sounds
meaning nothing to me,
though those who speak them nod,
agree
with each other,
their speech a wall I cannot reach beyond.
My mother voiced expressions I still speak,
"Honeybunch" to comfort a small child.
My father made rebukes that left their scars,
"Stop monkeying around, you guttersnipe."
I
have a silent secret,
and could encrypt it here,
but once that secret leaves my mind
some hacker may decode those lines,
turning the joke on me.
A
Complicated Word
No
one in my family said “I love you”
though
my mother wrote it on birthday cards.
In
emails I make the subject line
“from
Lorna,”
escaping
the choice
of
“love from…”
which
is like standing on a high, windy place
while
the recipient,
standing
safely back
may
choose
not
to join me on the precipice
but
merely send back
their
bare, loveless name.
Hero Worship
I
shut my eyes and cannot see
the image of yourself in front of me;
before my eyeballs all is black
until I build the image that I lack.
Not
content to copy from the world,
I spread a colored rainbow, now unfurled,
making the image a stranger to the man,
built up more near a god than mortals can.
Should
you return and let me see
you shrink to human size and frailty,
I could not love the image rendered cold
nor your living self who formed the mold.
Better
you should live only in my dream
than reappear, your laugh the sad requiem
of both this fancy and my love for you --
the false one sadly dearer than the true.
On the Subway
“Pardon,
please, may I sit here;
there isn't any seat that's clear?”
She
glares at me to show her pain
and how I should have missed the train,
gathers stuff with lack of speed;
eventually a seat is freed.
She
jostles -- (to get me to admit
how troublesome my urge to sit).
But guilt is free, says the savant;
I've paid the fare
and her packages haven't.
Foolish Games
“A
circle revolves,” the fool declares,
playing
our party’s jester.
“Put
your chairs in a ring.
It’s
revolutionary!
It
returns on itself.”
My
mind circles back
to
the man who loved puns
though
I hated his word-based humor,
this
present fool a reflection of the other,
who
was never such a fool
as
when he loved me;
nor
I ever such a fool
not
to love him.
The
Fate of the Foil-wrapped
The
mouse that devoured the world
left
countries fractured,
continents
in shredded silver foil,
oceans
mangled;
so
before you are bested by rodents,
you’d
better unwrap and eat
your
cleverly wrapped chocolate globe.
The Large and the Small
The
cruise ship, 13 stories tall,
a
high-rise town that glides through seas,
makes
diverging rivers in its wake,
While
at the stern, air intake sucks
giant gulps to
its vast screens
and
pins small moths with gaping wings.
Knowing Like the Back of My Hand
a
common phrase I say unplanned,
but not the sort that can withstand
the scrutiny of being scanned
for
when I stop and really look,
I find my hand a foreign book
whose close attachment I mistook
for truly knowing; I forsook
attention
to its bluish veins
long fingers, tendons ridged, domains
of freckled flesh, a scar's remains,
arthritis when a joint complains;
I
strike my keyboard, hold my pen,
I clench, release my hands again,
but stop and marvel seeing when
each finger seems a comedienne.
As Fallible as We are
After
his suicide,
going
through his things,
I
discover among old papers
a
psychological test
administered
long ago
to
a depressed and searching soul:
“Clinical
Inventory...
for
professional use only
should
not be shown to the patient
or
their relatives”
the
qualities listed -
“narcissistic
self-defeating
antisocial
schizoid
aggressive
sadistic
compulsive”
and
two dozen more -
shock
me to see how sick and unlikeable
the
test declared him.
I
have no idea how
he
stole a copy
of
this pathological report,
no
memory of his ever mentioning it,
no
way of knowing whether he re-read it recently,
and
turned those words into self-hatred…
…only
the realization that
all
the negative labels missed
his
surreptitiously taking it,
his
secretiveness never speaking of it.
Now,
shredding the pages into oblivion,
I
tell myself
that
test was designed by humans
as
fallible as he was,
someone
we loved,
Mrs Ross and
Mrs Michael
Long
ago, the newspaper noted
that
Mrs Ross Cheriton
and
Mrs Michael Power
(as
if their strength came from their husbands),
with
other women of the neighborhood,
stood
guarding the stately maple trees
from
the city workers
sent
to cut them down.
Half
a century later,
the
newspaper carries obituaries
for
“Muriel” and “Nancy,”
now
resting
while
the maples
(that
ash trees would have replaced
before
invasive insects destroyed the ash)
still
stand.
“Trick or Treat”
Leaving
evening news,
I
open the door and crouch,
my
purple hair on a level
with
the mermaid's blonde tresses
and
iridescent green scales,
the
ghoul’s scary mask and
boy's
soprano: “Trick or Treat.”
Children’s
eyes meet mine briefly,
then
gone into the night --
jack
o'lanterns lighting the lawns,
flashing
skulls in a tangle of cobwebs
on
our neighbor's porch,
masked
teenage boy sitting zombie-like
beside
a scarecrow,
eerie
sounds emerging --
collective
celebration
of
our human darkness,
temporary
but blessed obliteration
of
two-dimensional disasters.
The Child Violinist
The
violinist strides before the crowd;
tuxedo tails half-hide his wooden god,
light on the spot where he has bowed
and stands before the mass, a thousand odd.
The
violin and its long arm, the bow
rise from his side. Some force commands:
to make such music, thy soul forego.
The player, moving, obeys the unseen hands
and ears receive those heavenly notes.
Choirs within the air begin to sing
and angel song from unseen throats
plays the player as puppets dance on string.
The
song now ends, he stands and downs his bow;
once
puppet, now living boy - Pinocchio!
Cross-country Ski in Shadowbrook
Along
the old logging road,
trees
are scarred by the chain flail;
their
bark and wood hang like flesh
where
the machine has abraded their trunks.
In
the white snow
mauve
and pink splotches
are
tie-dye color
that
spreads from shrunken berries
fallen
from the nearby bushes --
dissolving
in the snow,
giving
off a sunrise of color.
If
these were stains
from
a snowmobile's engine,
would
I see sunrise
or
soiled snow?
If
I thought bears had clawed the trees,
would
I see ravage
or
the timeless intimacy
of
wild creatures and their brethren plants?
Searsburg Windmills
Stark
shamans on a frosted hill
turn
their 3-pronged trinity
of
silver arms.
Worshipful
trees raise limbs
laden
with snow.
In
the sky
a
pale sun
behind
grey clouds
is
a full moon,
a
motionless deity.
As if I were a Radio,
I
turn down the volume
and
hardly hear you leave;
later,
through complicated echoes,
I
write letters to my memories.
Sending
them
is
part of the script,
making
your absence
as
tangible
as
your presence.
When
your letters arrive,
I
carry them around unopened,
keeping
the scenario finite.
When
your voice comes by satellite,
it
breaks into a closed circuit;
you
become
the
other end of the spectrum,
as
real to me
as
I am to myself.
Saying “I Love You”
test title
When
you first began to say
“I
love you,”
it
took me time
to
venture out
tentatively
to
the edge
of
that high diving tower
and
risk the plunge;
But, if
I don’t love
your
beautiful, complex spirit
in
love with me,
who
can I say I love?
A New Story
During
long bus rides in India,
gazing
out windows for hours,
trying
to figure out
where
my life went wrong:
career
disrupted,
marriage
avoided,
who
to blame
that
I learned about power
but
not about love?
When
my self-exile ended
and
I returned to my native land,
it
took years
to
write the sequel:
vocation
found,
marriage
not a prison
but
continual dance
improvised
day by day.
Now
the life I planned to leave
is
no longer in danger
from
heights
where
I look out
with
gratitude and wonder.
Growing
up in Edmonton, Alberta, Lorna Cheriton acquired a love of nature from camping
and sailing with her family in western Canada.
A trip with her grandmother inspired later travels including across
Canada, Europe, the Soviet Union, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Hawaii. Further travels took her to Europe,
Guatemala, India, China, Japan, Fiji, Australia and New Zealand. After beginning to write poetry as a young
adolescent, she found her urge to make poems rekindled by a college course in
twentieth-century poetry.
Living
in Bennington, Vermont, and a member of the Catamount Lane Poets, she continues
to enjoy the magic and magnetism of playing with words.
edit
No comments:
Post a Comment